santa100 wrote:During the rainy retreats, there used to be a standard practice for a monk to periodically undergoes review and examination in front of his fellow monk sangha. He would stand in front of them and ask them to review and point out any problem or mistake he has been making so that he can correct those errors and improve his practice. I'm not a Vinaya expert but remember there's a Pali term for this procedure. I wonder if this tradition has been lost nowadays and that monks, especially those who are famous or holding high ranking position of abbot or temple president are exempted from having to do this anymore?

Ah thanks. Just looked it up and it's supposed to take place at the end of every annual rains retreat. This is a very important practice. Even for us lay folks, every year we have to undergo careful annual review with our boss regarding our job performance and could be fired for not doing a good job. While us lay folks can have different opinions about the conduct of a monk, it's ultimately up to the monastics sangha to analyze, examine and decide what's best to do. Hence my inquiry on whether the practice equally applies to every monk regardless of rank or seniority. Maybe some input from full time monastics on DW would be helpful..

Def. wrote:Pavaara.na:
The annual formal assembly for bhikkhus that marks the end of the Rains Retreat; when each monk offers the others the opportunity to admonish him for any transgressions he may have committed.

Looking at the original article and comments ven. Bodhi is clear that human life begins near conception and that abortion is definitely killing a human life: in short he follows Theravada position.

His argument against govt. restrictions on abortion are based on freedom of choice and keeping govt. out of it...Fair enough.

Still there are over 800,000 abortions each year in the USA, and if Trump was able to reduce that number by even 10% then over the course of his presidency 320,000 lives would be spared, in that 4 year period alone.

Isn't this the democracy?
If majority religious group voted for a particular religious issue the president has to accept it.
isn't it?
I know minority can object to it.

The US in not a 'democracy'. It is a constitutional republic and representative democracy.

And the answer is "not exactly". Were the people to elect representatives to the House who supported a particular religious issue, and they were to present and pass such a law (and then the Senate does the same), then the president would have the option to sign that bill into law. Even at that point the president is not obligated to listen and could veto (cancel) the bill. (Religious issues that would violate the First Amendment to the Constitution would not fare so easily and only a new amendment abolishing those aspects of the first amendment would allow for such an issue to become law. That would likely never happen.)

There are however certain legal issues that can be voted upon at the state and local level where the "popular vote" directly decides the fate of the issue (marijuana legalization for instance). In these cases, the vote would be considered a directly democratic decision.

Laws are guided by religious values. In a country like the USA, which is majority Christian you cannot expect laws based on core Buddhist teachings. In countries like Poland or Southern Ireland you can find laws based on Catholicism. If you want laws based on Buddhism, Tāvatiṃsa may be your best option.

America has a "seperation of Church and state" that is designed to protect both religious people from persecution and the state from religious takeover. It will be interesting to see what happens with Trump in charge, since the main challenge to religious hegemony in American is gay and trans rights.

世尊在靈山會上拈華示眾眾皆默然唯迦葉破顏微笑世尊云The Lord dwelt at the Vulture Peak with the assembly and plucked a flower as a teaching. The myriad totality were silent, save for Kāśyapa, whose face cracked in a faint smile. The Lord spoke. 吾有正法眼藏涅槃妙心實相無相微妙法門不立文字教外別傳付囑摩訶迦葉。I have the treasure of the true dharma eye, I have nirvāṇa as wondrous citta, I know signless dharmatā, the subtle dharma-gate, which is not standing on written word, which is external to scriptures, which is a special dispensation, which is entrusted to Mahākāśyapa.नस्वातोनापिपरतोनद्वाभ्यांनाप्यहेतुतः

robertk wrote:His argument against govt. restrictions on abortion are based on freedom of choice and keeping govt. out of it...Fair enough.

I think the Venerable's point was more keeping religion out of it.

A quote I heard and like, which I think sums this up, goes something like, "we should have freedom of religion and freedom from religion".

I think all countries, no matter religious or not, have laws against killing humans.
So I don't follow the reasoning that restricting abortion is bringing religion in?

It is part of the Secular Humanist/New Atheist ideology that "experience=humanity". so it follows, from a secular-humanist and "new atheist" paradigm, that those who lack experience, lack humanity. we are defined by our memories and ability to remember them.

The labelling of foreign ideologies as "religious" is a strategy of secular humanism and radical atheism to discredit opposing viewpoints and metaphysics.

世尊在靈山會上拈華示眾眾皆默然唯迦葉破顏微笑世尊云The Lord dwelt at the Vulture Peak with the assembly and plucked a flower as a teaching. The myriad totality were silent, save for Kāśyapa, whose face cracked in a faint smile. The Lord spoke. 吾有正法眼藏涅槃妙心實相無相微妙法門不立文字教外別傳付囑摩訶迦葉。I have the treasure of the true dharma eye, I have nirvāṇa as wondrous citta, I know signless dharmatā, the subtle dharma-gate, which is not standing on written word, which is external to scriptures, which is a special dispensation, which is entrusted to Mahākāśyapa.नस्वातोनापिपरतोनद्वाभ्यांनाप्यहेतुतः

Coëmgenu wrote:
The labelling of foreign ideologies as "religious" is a strategy of secular humanism and radical atheism to discredit opposing viewpoints and metaphysics.

yes, and Bodhi himself makes clear (in his comments to the article) that " I believe that the life-process begins when a stream of consciousness coming from a deceased being “connects” with the newly fertilized ovum. Thus I consider the embryo to be a living being, a potential human being, and on these grounds I hold that a woman who adheres to the Buddha’s teaching and wants to live in accordance with its ethical code should not have an abortion "

so he is not in accord with the thinking that life magically begins only after the baby leaves the womb.

lyndon taylor wrote:I think when a candidates platform, if put into effect, would cause so much suffering for so many people, like Trumps would, I would expect any socially aware Bhikkhu to speak out against that. I think Bhikkhu Bodhi clearly made a good choice to release his statement. This isn't just another Democrat vs Republican thing, this is much worse than that. I mean a lot of people's attitudes is like Jews in Nazi Germany telling each other," don't worry, he wouldn't really do that, how much worse can it get."

Trump's policy will only cause suffering to the fat cats exporting jobs to other countries, and illegal immigrants. If Mexico wants great companies, let them build them, rather than stealing US jobs with cheap labor. And if Mexicans want better jobs, let them make their country better. There is nothing wrong with making your country great again by ceasing to let fat cats export your jobs and import cheap labor..
edited by mod to remove offensive comment

1) Some religious objections to abortion hinge on the existence of an immortal "soul" upon conception, explicit, if my memory serves, in Roman Catholic dogma. In the Buddhist worldview, it's different, though it's still (if one takes conception vs birth as the critical event) human life, that's considered precious, as well as life in general which is not to be taken away (harmed).

2) I'm reminded in this discussion that at times the purported views of the Buddha were seemingly more nuanced by circumstances, rather than stated as absolute maxims -- e.g. as if commanded by "God" to Moses, Jesus, Mohamed, etc.

Examples:

a) The euthanasia debate here recently (c.f. "Bhante Jag");

b) The story (somewhere in the Pali Canon) of a man, woman with their infant crossing a desert or such, running out of food, and feeding on the baby as the least of the presenting evils and the one allowing for the survival of the species, so to speak -- they could, if surviving, have further children. Again, if my memory serves, the Buddha did not condemn that. (Could be wrong on that, where assuredly it will be promptly corrected here.)